Editing

6/11/12                                                 Rebecca's brother drawing "FUCK" on his arm.

At the start of this week, Hannah did most of the editing while Rebecca and myself started the print work for our album advertisement. Hannah imported the footage of Rebecca's brother writing the word "Fuck" on his hand. She also had to split the to put the footage of the "fuck" in-between the current footage of James and Robynne walking in the park so that it matches the lyrics. 

After splitting the clip, Hannah found that the iMovie started freezing the ends of new imported clips. As a group, we decided not to do anything about this because when we first started and had the same problem, our teacher advised us that the footage might stop freezing when we import it to a disc. 

Hannah was also able to add a footage of Robynne and James walking in the park, in-between a shot of Ian walking away from Robynne to make the visual faster and choppier so that it matches that sound. Myself and Rebecca thought Hannah's idea works well as the audience will sympathise with Ian's character, and so continuing the narrative.

                                                                                   James and Robynnne walking away together

7/11/12

During this lesson, we ask some students in class to watch and give us feedback of our video so far. We asked four questions and they include;

1. How do you think our video reflects the metal-core genre?
2. What do you like/dislike about the video?
3. How do you think the editing works with the visuals?
4. How can we improve the video?

 







Feedback from qestionnaire


Not everyone in our class listens to the metal-core genre, so we had a range of views from our classmates. Someone said "Imagery/motifs reflect genre and target audience;fire writing on arm, live gig" for question one. Another person said "I like pace of the editing and with the music" for question 2, "I don't actually know what the song is saying" for question 3 and and for question 4, someone said "develop storyline in the background do it makes sense".

After knowing that our storyline might be confusing for some of our audience, we decided to move and add some footage. We thought that our audience might be getting confused by the difference between the two male characters , James and Ian. They might not know who is breaking up with Robynne and who went together with her.  So we decided to add a footage of Robynne and James walking towards the camera in-between Ian walking away so that the audience can see that Robynne is no longer with Ian; and has moved on. This works well because the idea of Ian walking away emphasis the lyrics of a couple breaking up and one moving on. 

James and Robynne hand in hand

 

 

8/11/12

During this lesson, we wanted to make our video easier to look at and understood by our audience. Hannah took out the footage of Robynne and James walking and replaced it with Ian and Robynne walking to keep the narrative clear. She also change the footage so that we could use it later in the video. After watching the video on the full screen, Hannah also spotted an editing error. When Ian first walk away from the bench, he is just about to turn the corner. We cut that shot to live shot, and to another narrative shot which means that a few minutes must have gone. However, when we went back to that shot, he is still in the same position, so there was no continuity. Hannah changed this shot and put it forward so that continuity is achieved. 
Hannah thought by Ian walking away from their breakup, the audience only sympathsed with Ian's character, so she decided to add a shot of Robynne smoking on the bench and looking sad. She changed the saturation from the average of 51% to slightly darker 49% so that the mood of the video is quit depressing and the audience can see that Robynne is also affected by their breakup.

Robynne sad about their break-up

Hannah changed the saturation for that shot to make it deem.

13/11/12

This a zoom in image of the blurry shot we used.







Clear shot
During this lesson, I decided to do some editing with Hannah along with some feedback at each stage from Rebecca. I thought it will be a good idea to change the steady, clear shot of Robynne and James sat on the bench in the park to a blurry, hand-held shot of both of them on the same bench. The blurry shot moves away from them, so the audience are kept in suspense as they wait to see who she is with (James or Ian?). We didn't just put in the blurry shot in the video because it might look good. We thought it could be a metaphor for memory and relationship. We then cut back to the shot of the arm progressing, and then to a live footage of Ian playing the drums, and then back to the zoom out shot revealing who is sat on the bench.

We then cut to the shot where Ian is walking away at the top of the park by the lane. The idea behind putting a shot of James and Robynne in the park together before adding a shot of Ian walking away is to show that he knows about Robynne's relationship with James and he has come to accept it and is moving on. For the shot of Ian walking away alone, we changed the saturation to 55% to emphasis his sadness.


Saturation of 55% to dull the mood

We thought it will be better to make the video choppier as it's an important music convention in this genre. We cut 0.9 seconds from the shot of James and Robynne talking on the bench and 0.5 seconds from the shot of Ian walking away.
                                                                                         shorter cuts to make it choppier

Hannah and Rebecca tried to trim out the man talking

Cutting off the shots allowed time to add in a fire shot before cutting back to the shot of Ian walking away. By the end of this lesson, we had reached the part of the music where an unknown male's voice is talking over the music and we  think was an editing error, and so Hannah and Rebecca decided to try and cut it out, but without releasing, they ended up removing the lyrics out of synchrony with the visuals. During the next lesson, Hannah and I decided to start editing the music again to make it synchronise with the live footage at the start of the video, and Hannah later came back during her free lesson and finished the editing.

Ideas for print work.

We started thinking of ideas of what we could include on the print work and promotional material of the music video. We thought it will be a good idea to use some still images from the footage intended for our music so that the print work will be cohesive to the video. 

Some of the key images that stood out from the footage for us, and we though might be cohesive, if used for the front and back cover were the following; 

This image would be good to use on the cover of the album because it is prominent in the video, we the audience can see the the lyrics on the paper which was our aim of writing on the papers.

We thought that this image would be cohesive to the lyrics as it emphasis James's lyrics of "carve the four letter word". 

Again, this image is cohesive to the lyrics as it emphasis the lyrics of the breakdown of a relationship.

This image could be used in the print work as it is of the band performing onstage which will be cohesive to the to the video and most of the footage is of the band on stage. It also shows all the band members which could be seen as introducing the band rather than having a general picture of them posing. 


Even though we cannot use all this pictures for the album cover, we will choose two which we like the most for the album, and then the rest of the images will be use for promotional materials such as posters to advertise the band further. 

Start of Editing

In today's lesson we started edited the first footage Rebecca filmed. I noticed that we cannot exactly follow our story board as first planned, we took of some scenes form the storyboard and improvised other scenes. We inter-cut footages from "Remember the Ruined" live performance which was filmed a few wee ago and put it together with the narrative shots of Robynne, James and Ian so that the video almost look "jumpy".  So far, what we find most difficult when editing is synchronising live footage to the diegetic sound.

What I have learn so far in editing is the significant of planning and preparation. Even though we planned our storyboard, because we were not able to film every idea of the video, we have problems following the narrative thereby making the visuals almost impossible to synchronise with the sound.

We imported the live and narrative footage into iMove to edit. We all already had a gist of how this software works as we used it early this year to edit our films.

Live footage of the band performing in Fleece in Bristol.

















A blur shot of fire burning.

In the group, we are confuse of what footage to use to start the video. The decision is split as some of us want a live footage, Ian carving into his hand or the blurry fire. I personally want the blurry fire because it gives a sense of memory, some one trying to retrieve a lost memory which would converge  with the narrative as Ian is still in love with Robynne in the video.

Questionnaire and Pie Chart

We used the research into the metal-core lifestyle to do a questionnaire to see what the niche audience would want to see in our own music video. Below is a unanswered and answered questionnaire.

Blank questionnaire (1)

Blank questionnaire (2)

Answered questionnaire (1)


















Answered questionnaire (2)


From the answered questionnaires, we were able to create pie chart to show the response from our audience:

1.) As seen above, more females took part in the questionnaire than males.

2.) The majority of the people who listen to this music are teenagers. This might be because most of our audience research was done on students from school who fall within this age group. The audience age group works well with our music as the band members are teenagers and so might be able to relate  to the audience.

3.) As seen, we asked people who like different range of music rather than focusing on a particular target audience who prefer the metalcore genre, music and life style. From this, we though we could add ideas from other music genre conventions so we could get more audience.

4.) Just as the favourite music, they are equally people who wouldn't like to listen any of the music genres listed.

5a.) Gigs is a prominent part of the metal-core life style, and from experience, I would rather attend a gig because it gives a real sense of connction to the band. From the result, our target audience would have been to a gig to understand the importance of gigs in the metal-core genre.

5b.) Peopl attend gigs, for metal-core music and other music genres for several reason. As shown above, some metal-core fans attend it for the atmosphere.

6.)Metallica and Iron Maiden are some of the inspiring bands in the metal genre, so, it is no doubt that the majority of the participants in our audience research like them the most. This is also good for our music as "Remember the Ruined" takes inspiration of their style of music from them, so the audience will like our band.

7.) Live footage is always included in metal-core music video and so, we would also be including it in our music video.

8.) From research into metal core life style and audience research, gig venues are usually included in metal-core videos, so we plan to include in our own video as well.

9.) Live footage is an important convention for metal core genre, and our video fits this as we plan to include a significant amount of live footage.

10.) The majority prefers emphasis on lyrics, but we plan to emphasis both but especially on music through live footage.

11.) Metal-core bands try to avoid lip synching when performing their song as an error trying to sing at the wrong time or act uncertainly can damage their throat.. The results from the fits well with our idea as we have live footage of the band singing which we could match with the visuals.

12.) This again fits well with our plan as we want members of the band (Ian, James and Robynne) to be in the video.

13.) It is not surprising that their first impression would be "scary" as the music is quite loud. This does not however affects our music as the audience already know what to expect.

14.) From watching some of their video, I also think Bullet For My Valentine creates effective videos. It is also important that we look at other video, even the unpopular bands, and see how they create their video and what image they are sending to their audience.

15.) We will look at music videos from these band(The Devil Wears Prada, Trivium and Bullet For My Valentine), and what makes them memorable. We will the try to include some of the elements so as to satisfy our target audience.

Storyboarding and Filming

As a group and from analysing other music videos, we came up with ideas of what we wanted in our music video and Hannah drew them on a storyboard. 

 1.) We decided to start our video with a live footage of the band performing "Remember the Ruined", which was filmed by Hannah and me.

2.) Quick cut and close-up shot of Ian standing in front of a white plain background.

3.) Another quick quick cut and close-up shots of Robynne against a plain background. We want to include an element of the "Male Gaze" by possibly showing close-up shots of Robynne's lip and eye.

4.) Quick cut of live footage of the band to synchronise the music.

5.) Narrative footage of Robynne and Ian which would lead to their break up. In this shot, both characters are in the centre of the frame. The argument synchronise the diegetic sound. 

6.) Some more live footage of the band to synchronise the sound.

7.) Out of rage and frustration from their break-up, Ian burns up the lyrics which he wrote for Robynne. This again synchronise with the diegetic sound of the James's vocals. 

8.)  More live footage of the band to synchronise the diegetic sound, with more of Jame's "screamed vocals" 

 9.) Shot of Robynne kissing James on a bench in a park to synchronises Jame's clean vocals. 

10.) We cut to more live footage of the band performing to synchronise the sound which might include the band "head-banging"  (A key convention of the metal-core genre)

11.) Return to narrative of the burn out lyrics to synchronise the diegetic sound of "growling" screamed by James. 

12.) A quick cut to live footage with more head-banging shots of the band. 

 13.) Ian carving the four letter word into his arm synchronises Jame's Lyrics.  This shot would be filmed against a plain background to avoid any effect of colouring.

14.) Cut back to live footage of the band performing.

15.) More extended shots of live footage of the band members. Some of the band's fans might be included in this shot to demonstrate the metal-core life style and how the band relates to their audience.

16.) Quick cut to Ian's fully cut arm to synchronise the Jame's lyrics "carve the four letter word in to your arm".

17.) A final quick cut of Robynne walking glumly in the rain on an empty road

18.) The final shot is of the screen fading to black as the diegetic sound comes to an end.


After drawing our storyboard, one of the ideas we wanted in our music video as seen above is Ian burning up a paper with the lyrics written on it. Below as some papers Rebecca made by pouring hot coffee on it to make it look vintage. We included a vintage look because it is sometimes used in some metal-core music videos, and it could also be seen as a metal-core convention.

Each member in my group wrote out the lyrics in different colours and font size so that we could choose what works best when filming our video.

Start of Filming:

Due to different school schedules with the band members, we were not all able to go and film the narrative of our video. Rebecca went to meet some members of the band; Robynne, Ian and James on Friday after school to start our filming. She was able to film scenes including  Robynne was breaking up with Ian in a park on a bench, and  Ian walking off angrily. She also filmed some scenes of James and Robynne getting together in the same park where Robynne broke up with Ian. There were also scenes of them talking in the park and then walking off together. However, Rebecca wasn't able to film all of the plan we had on the storyboard such as individual footage of Robynne and Ian. We are either trying to get hold of the band again to film the missing footage if we can, if not we will improvise with what we have.

Below are some still images of the narrative Rebecca was able to film.

 Robynne and Ian breaking up.

 Robynne and James getting together

 James and Robynne walking off together










 We thought that fire/ burning was an important metal-core convention from analysing other metal- core videos, and so we decided to fire into our own video. Rebecca was also able to film the shots of the lyrics burning up.  

We were thinking of using the shot to start our video instead of in the middle because it adds and effect of mystery and  uncertainty to the audience. 

The Theory of Spectatorship

In today's lesson, we looked at the idea of Spectatorship, how it is used in the Music Industry and the different views people take when reviewing a music video.There are three main spectators; Passive, Negotiating and Libertarian spectator.

Passive
Preferred reading:  The audience takes the preferred meaning of the media text intended by the director. They accept the message and values of the text without questioning it, which is usually associated with pleasure. 
For example, if a preferred reading watches the film Pulp Fiction, they might think it is very excited and the characters are extremely entertaining and pleasurable.

Negotiating
Negotiated reading: These readers understand the meaning behind the text, but continue to retain their own views and believes. They are very active in the position of deciding whether they like the text or not.
For example, if a negotiated reading watches the film Pulp Fiction, they will understand the concept and might enjoy watching Vincent and Jules as criminals, however they might maintain their belief as the film is sending out the wrong message to the society.

Libertarian
Opposing reading: They reject the intended purpose of the media text, as the response to displeasure. They belief that they are different interpretations to the media text. Libertarian are more of the critics to a media text.
For example, if the viewer was watching the film Pulp Fiction, they would find everything in the film as very childish and dis-pleasuring.

After looking at the three main spectator, we watched some music videos and applied the spectatorship to them.

The first example we watched is Call On Me- Eric Prydz

Passive: A passive viewer would find the music video good because it has a lot of beautiful women acting sexually while exercising. There would look at the video only at face value, how the director intended for it to be consume.

Negotiation:  A negotiating viewer would understanding the purpose of the video, which could be trying to encourage it's audience to join the gym or take exercising. They might also take the view of "it is just a music video, so I am allowed to watch it and enjoy myself". However, they might hold the view that the sexualisation of the video was unnecessary and inappropriate.

Libertarian: An opposing viewer would hold a strong view against the video. They would say that the video is unnecessary and inappropriate because there was no point of acting like that as it is unrealistic and sexist.

Beyonce: Best Thing I Never Had

Passive: A passive viewer would see this video at face value and interpret  Beyonce character as beautiful, pure and probably perfect as she is about to be marry. Teenage girls might envy her, and would want to be similar to Beyonce.

Negotiation: A negotiating viewer would question the perfection of Beyonce's character to a certain extend, as they would say women wouldn't walk around in their linger before their wedding for everyone to see; it's a bit to perfect for reality. however, they might like the fact that message from the video is empowering and she looks beautiful in her wedding dress.

Libertarian: An opposing viewer would say that the video looks to perfect to be real and it tries to objectify women. They would also say that the characters in the video have been airbrush and the lighting is unnatural.

We used Marilyn Mansoon - Tourniguet as a third example of the spectatorship. This video is obviously very controversial and has been band in several countries around the world because of it's unambiguous content..
 Marilyn Manson- Tourniquet

Passive:  A passive viewer would take the intended interpretation and say that it's about being alternative and celebrating difference. the video expresses emotion and some teenagers might find it cool because it challenges the mainstream music style.

Negotiating: A negotiating viewer is that he should be allowed to be comfortable with his individuality. They might appreciate some camera work and video content, but other viewers might find the content such as bug eating extremely uncomfortable.

Libertarian: An opposing viewer would say that it is good the video was banned because it causes problems in the society.


We also looked at how the spectators would respond to characters within a media text. We looked at three main responses; recognition, alignment and allegiance.

Recognition: This is when we translate the character into a credible and convincing person. The viewer bring their own knowledge and understanding to the media text. For example; Beyonce's video is meant to give the audience the idea of perfect ending and weddings.

Alignment: This is when we feel and relate to part of a story through the characters. For example, we feel a connection to Beyonce as w woman who has recovered from heart-broke and is getting marry.

Allegiance: This is when the film is made so that the audience should have loyalty to the characters, consciously or not. For example, the audience are made to feel sorry for Beyonce through out the video.

Spectator in our video: 

 Hypothetically speaking, before making our video, we started thinking of ways that our music video would be consume by the three spectators, Passive, Negotiating and Libertarian. 

Passive: A passive viewer would take our video at face value. The  typical audience for the metal-core genre is likely to be both male and female teenagers who understand and are involved with the metal- core lifestyle. They would like the relationship between the two characters and possibly enjoy the idea that she gets attention from two of the members from the band. The passive viewers might appreciate the metal- core conventions such as the "live performance". 

Negotiating: A negotiating viewer would both appreciate and criticize our video. They might find the relationship between the band members "sweet", can also appreciate the life performance. However, the negotiating viewers would criticize our video by stating that the teenagers in our video are represented in an unrealistic way.

Libertarian:  An opposing viewer might hold a strong view against our video because they would state that it is unrealistic. They would criticise the narrative for it childish nature and condemn the use of "fuck", which would be printed on Ian's arm in the video.


 Response in our video:

I think our video is definitely appropriate to the concept of different responses within the music industry.

Recognition: I think the teenage audience would be able to relate to the band members as the are teenagers as well. The relationship between the characters is also believable as most teenagers go through similar situation.
Alignment: The audience can feel and relate to band members and the metal-core lifestyle through Robynne (the female character in the video). They understand the burnt lyrics, Ian carving the word "fuck" on his arm would be presented through Robynne who is  given prevalence regarding editing.
Allegiance: The audience is given loyalty to Ian's character who is going through a break up with Robynne. Despite not knowing the cause of their breakup (which could possibly Ian's), the audience might still sympathize with him and remain totally loyal to him through out the video.

Theory: The Male Gaze

In today's lesson, we looked at the theory of  "The Male Gaze". We also looked at how prominent it is in the media industry especially how it is used in music videos.

The male gaze is a feminist theory that was developed by Laura Mulvey in 1975. She put forward the following arguments of the male gaze. They include;

• She stated that the audience are always put in the position of the heterosexual male position when viewing a a media text such as a music video. This is the idea that the mainstream media text is to reflect and satisfy a heterosexual male unconsciously. 
• She emphasis that the camera is always put on the curvy position of a woman's body and there are presented largely in context of the man's reaction to the event. 
• Male characters in the video objectifies women and make them the objects of their gaze. Women watching this text are then forced to take the position of a man. 

In class, we watched the video "She's so lovely" by Scouting for girl and analysed how the male gaze is used in this video.

• The song is filmed from a man's prospective and we see the men's reaction to her presence, all staring at her, and the audience see her through close-up shots.
• There is also close-up of her legs as she walks into the room. They is also close up of her lips which is a stereotypical sexual element of a woman.  
• She gets the most prevalence during editing, but we don't see her reaction when she is treated like an object by the men.
• We see the man slapping her bum as a joke, and the man responding very superior to it but we don't see her reaction to it, which the audience might consider sexual harassment.

Examples of controversial male gaze covers

Nuttin' to Do - Bad meets Evil (1999)

                                                                               The Strokes - Is This It (2001)

2 Live Crew - As Nasty As They Wanna Be (1989)


These albums cover were very controversial because they objectify women in all of them. These are good examples for the theory of "The Male Gaze" and in used in media, particularly in the music industry. They show that the theory can be used to challenge women and objectify them.

The "The Male Gaze" is used other ways in terms of context which still manages to attract it's niche audience and extends it's target audience to a slightly wider population such as teenagers.

They include;

Beyonce - Dangerously in Love

Christina Aguilera - Stripped

Katy Perry - Teenage Dream


As seen on the three album covers, the context of the album covers are different but women are still shown in a voyeuristic way which supports Mulvey's theory  of The Male Gaze.  Unlike the controversial album covers which were of male artist, these are all of female artist who also aim to target female teenage audience. This might explain the reason why The Male Gaze used is more tone down but we would question why they will use sexual/naked pictures of themselves when it is aim at teenagers. The theory of 'the Male Gaze' is not only to attract men, as seen on the three cover but also to attract a more diverse audience.  It aims to attract women by objectifying women in a way that other women feel they have to look like that or look attractive that way.

The reality is that this images are incorporated in our minds in such a way that most teenage girls don't look at it when buying the album because in a way we already expect it to be there and so it is not as significant to us anymore.

However, the Male Gaze can be subverted such as the man a is being objectified rather than a woman. When the Male Gaze is challenged, they usually become controversial. Examples of converting male gaze include;

Prince - Lovesexy

The Rolling Stone - Sticky Fingers

Apex Twin - Windowlicker



These three album covers are examples of challenging 'The Male Gaze'. It is important to know that we understand the Apex Twin cover as an idea of a man in a woman's body which in a way is still trying to objectify women as the breast are very visible and could almost be seen as the central and focus of the album. The Lovesexy album subverts the theory of male gaze as we see Prince on the cover nude. This image again would be thought of as something a woman should be doing and not a man which goes on to emphasis the theory of the male gaze how easy and normal it is to objectify women. The Rolling Stone cover really tries to challenge the male gaze as the audience is able to see the man's erection through his trouser. The cover is very uncomfortable as we are not used to seeing men being presented in the music industry in this way. 

We decided that we will use only some concept of the male gaze in the music videorather than on the album cover. This is because it is unlikely to see the theory of the male gaze being used in the metal-core genre. Artist from this genre are more likely to use pictures of the nature or other elements of the metal-core genre conventions. In addition, this genre is unlikely to use the male gaze as their music is always focused on their inner emotions. Some aspect/artist uses the male gaze, for example 'Bullet for My Valentine' used it in 'waking the Demone' music video and the girl is shown as the reason for the conflict and bullying among the boys at the end of the video. However, metal-core does not use the male gaze to the extend in which other music genres uses it such as R&B and hip hop.

The influence of the male gaze would be seen in our music video through editing. The female character (Robynne) would get prevalence to the camera work in scenes such as fighting with a male character and sitting in the park with another boy. Furthermore, the male gaze would be seen through close- up shots of her face and other parts of her body.

We decided to include the male gaze in our work because we are aware that some parts of the metal genre uses similar aspects. However, we plan to keep the male gaze to a minimum so that it would not be exposed through out the video.